AN – DISCONTINUED

Yes, I am sorry to say that this story has been discontinued, aka I stopped writing it. I'm sorry for whoever still liked it, but I write for fun and writing a story I considered below my standards style-wise and content-wise (or in this case reaction-wise) is something I just can't do.

However, I will tell you all my reasons why – or if you don't care you can just close this tab, curse at me and then just shrug and go read another (better) story. Honestly, and with this I'm talking to all the reviews who spoke against this story, I am aware of just how horrible this story turned out. I am. I just didn't see any solution that didn't involve spending twice as much of my free time on it.

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Reasons

1 – Bashing.
This got out of hand almost immediately, with Neptune. Now, while I don't like Neptune, I can admit he didn't deserve the way I twisted and ruined his character even more. My actions were unforgivable. I bashed Neptune for what? Dozens of chapters? He really isn't the jealous type, or the envious type. He's basically a cooler, more skilled, smoother version of Jaune – still used for comedic relief, more of a ladies' man, but otherwise pretty similar once you think about it. I turned him into a Chaotic Evil NPC who had no other personality than being jealous or envious. I made a huge mistake and carried it on for dozens of chapters – and I'm the only one to blame.

But even though I'm disgusted by what I did with Neptune, to the point of making him go insane just for the sake of removing him from the story (and added crack, see reason 2 – Crack), he's not the 'crown jewel' of my bashing mistake.

That belongs to TES itself. I'm the goddamn idiot who was bashing a story he likes (because I do like TES, it's how LordHellPhoenix and I started to talk) and couldn't even see the bashing was stealing away the reactions from everyone. And that, that is completely unforgivable. What the characters point out may or may not be the harsh truth, but this was a reaction story, not a criticizing story, so.

Thankfully, Phoenix didn't feel insulted by it, because God knows how much he had the right to feel insulted after how this story turned out. He simply pointed it out as one of the reasons why he stopped reading this story (we'll come to that in reason 3 – One-Shot Reactions).

2 – Crack
Now, you may be about to say: "But crack is fun!". And you'd be right, crack is used only for fun (surely not for drama!). However, there is a method to using crack. In An Extension of the Soul, or at least its latest chapters, crack is used to enhance the story's pre-existing humour, not replace it (either the humour or the story itself).

In this story, crack has unfortunately slipped through the cracks (pun not intended) and infected the whole story. Every two seconds there's something stupid or nonsensical just for crack. That won't do. Especially when crack and bashing are going hand to hand, like with Neptune, or in a much lesser way with Team RWBY's recklessness.

3 – One-shot Reactions
As you might've noticed, there are a lot of reactions that are nothing more than "comment – reply – possible reply – possible reply" and nothing else. Every "reaction break" (as in, when the bold text stops) may have one or two or three of these one-shot reactions, but eventually the problem is the same – it feels as if you're watching a movie with a bunch of very annoying and talkative people who won't shut up with their little comments.

I'm sure we all hate that, and those who don't hate it, it's probably because they do it themselves, heh ;-)

This story became that, along other things. Just a bunch of nonsensical one-shot reactions who are a pain to read and ten times worse to write. There is no topic to talk about, there is no logic being followed, nothing, just little comments and their replies. Which is fine for reaction stories, but only as long as you actually write other stuff too, or at least make them funny. I did neither, at least in the latest chapters.

4 – Unexisting Style
This story had no writing style. Not a stable one, at least. It just jumped from complete crack to drama, to serious, to comedy, to I-don't-know-what. Looking back, I'm disgusted and ashamed that I fed you all such a jumble of styles/themes/whatever-you-want-to-call-them.

In addition, remember the gifts from the authors from waaaaaay back? I do. I've been thinking, and thinking, and thinking about bringing them back, but every time I just couldn't bring myself to do it, for whatever the reason. I'm really sorry about that, by the way, especially to the guys who've sent gifts.

5 – OCs for Everyone!
Yay, we got a cast full of OCs! Wait, what do you mean those were the canon characters?

This should be pretty self-explanatory, but I'll say it nonetheless – the OoCness in this story is cringe-worthy. No, even more, it's indecent. As I write this, I literally just asked my twin to punch myself in the stomach (not that hard, don't worry, I'm fine) because of what I did. I mean, I go around preaching that one should keep their characters coherent, and then what do I do? I make a horrid mess of my own? Can I even call myself an author any more? (the answer is YES, definitely, just because this story didn't work out doesn't mean I'm not good at writing).

6 – Hey, Have You Seen My Plot?
Yes, I'm adding more and more humour as I go and accept the fact I messed up and this story is dead because of that. It helps me cope.

This story was born with some kind of semi-secondary-plot. It was a reaction story, not a reaction story, if you get what I mean. Where did that go? After JNPR vs RWBY, this story only kept one thing outside the reactions – the relationships (see reason 7 – Harem For Sale). Everything else got flushed down the toilet (which means you might be able to find it in the ocean or something).

7 – Harem for Sale
I don't write harems. Not because I hate them, or find them wrong (as long as love is mutual and all parties are fully aware of what they're doing, I don't care), or cannot physically write them. But because I don't understand them. When I don't understand something, I look it up and study it until I can understand enough to write it. But with harems, I can't, because people can't be studied online and despite knowing a guy who was in a relationship with 5 women, I never asked for details and he himself said it was mainly just for fun, nothing serious.

I don't understand harems, and yet I tried to write one. Initially this was going to be a Lancaster story, simply because at the time I was a Lancaster fan (now I don't have many preferences as long as it's well-written), but then I thought to ask Phoenix and he said he would appreciate it if I made the relationship the same as TES (aka, harem). I, as the naive writer I was back then, accepted, thinking I could manage.

Btw, the blame is one me and me alone, Phoenix never pushed me or anything. I overestimated myself (or rather estimated myself differently).

But since I can't write them, this relationship went from "taking it slow" to "gotta think" to "on standby, please wait". Which is horrible. Also, the confessions just felt rushed, OoC and fake.

(FYI, I write OoC because it's Out of Character, not Out Of Character, but most people write OOC and I can't fault them for that, it is easier)

8 – Main Quest: Epic Fail
Back to the title screen.

This story was born as a gift to my friend Phoenix. Yeah, now you might read it and say "Gift? Man, a punch in the face would've been better", but at first it wasn't meant to go like this, obviously – no author wants their stories to fail like this and I am no different.

But yeah, long story short, Phoenix doesn't like this story any longer, for all the reasons listed above. So he kindly let me know he wouldn't continue to read the story, to spare me from disappointment later. Ripped off the band-aid, basically. And I'm glad he did, because I agree, and because I appreciate the honesty it took.

So, if this story was meant for him, and he doesn't like it any more, then what's the point of it any more? I mean, had it been a good story, then I would've kept on writing (probably), but a story as bad as this? No, it's not worth it. It's better to use this time for writing other stuff, or doing other stuff, or simply sleeping (faraway dream...).

9 – if (will == 0) { ViewingTES = discontinued; }
And finally, onto my own personal reason. Aside from agreeing with all the points aforementioned, there is one extra point that I, as the author, have to add.

This story was hell to write.

As I said, I like TES – it was one of the stories that convinced me to try my hand at being an author! I just read it and said "Well, this proves fanfictions can be pretty long and interesting. It's no physical book but it's still a story. Why not write a story of my own?"

No, TES wasn't the problem. The reactions were.

Simply put, unless the reactions vary, I don't like reaction stories. WFM (Watching Future Mistakes, a HTTYD watch-movie1 story) is a bit easier because with everything that happens in HTTYD1, I always have something to write about. Also because with it being canon, I can just read fanfictions and see what other authors have pointed out about the movie, without having to over-analyse the movie myself every time.

With ViewingTES, I ran out of reactions to fill the gaps, not because there were no more, but because I stopped writing the canon characters and I wrote more like what I would've commented. Then even that ran out, so I just starting criticizing because it's easier.

Was it right? No. Am I human? Yes, and as such I sometimes take the shortcut too.

Due to the lack of reactions in my reaction-pool, every time I had to write a reaction was hell, because I had no idea what to write.

Then why did I start, then?

Well, that's my fault too. While chatting with Phoenix, he mentioned the fact that I had offered to write this story. I didn't remember doing so, but I naively accepted without thinking if I actually could. Also, I'd never written long reaction stories before (Remnants of Dimensions eventually had the same problem), so I wasn't prepared for it.

This, added to stress from other sources, definitely ruined this story, didn't it?

Jeez, looks like it's all my fault… though why wouldn't it be, I'm the author!

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Final note

So yeah, that's why. I'm really, really sorry everyone. This is my first time doing something like this (I did discontinue stories before but never when I got this far) so thank you for having listened to my rant.

But let's not make this a depressing goodbye note. Instead, let's remember these wise words:

"Never let mistakes push you into hopelessness, for they are what teaches you to do better. Instead, learn from them so that one day, you won't committhem any longer."

Until next story,

Khor Evik Vlakhavlakh

P. S. - to wash off the bad taste this AN and this story might've left in your mouth, go read TES, the original work. It's much better. XD And leave Phoenix a review, or a Fav and Follow, if you would.